I host a GLAAD Award-winning radio show on Sirius XM Radio called "Derek and Romaine". I wrote a book (finally). I star in a video podcast called "The So Real Life" on iTunes. I watch a lot of TV. I drink with my friends. I travel all the time. This is my life.

Monday, October 13, 2008

Play Ball

I get so torn about my life in moments like this. On the one hand, I relish my anonymity and all the trappings of "real life." At the same time, I have frequent urges to be in the center of the action. These are the two pulls in my life, tearing me constantly in opposite directions at the same time. Earlier today I was enjoying my Sunday political shows (who knew McLaughlin was such a raving FDR devotee!) and then winterizing my house. It's a quiet existence where I am more concerned with what to watch on TV than who is watching me. But then later, I headed down to the city for dinner with Ben Harvey and a debaucherous turn at the Hustlaball.

It was a gorgeous fall day. Crisp, as we like to say. And the leaves were just starting to turn and drop, even as the sun shown warmly through the thinning branches. On days like this, I love the long walks the city affords and made the trek from Grand Central to Union Square on foot. Ben was waiting for me in the bar of Republic looking as handsome as ever. Has it really been so many months since I saw him last?

Republic is one of my favorite places in the city. It is communist dining at its finest: inexpensive, fast, spare and they serve thai ice tea and green tea ice cream, two of my greatest rare pleasures in life. It was all new to Ben so he stuck with the reliable pad thai while I indulged in spicy duck noodle broth. We gossiped about work, caught up on love (or lack thereof), shared chicken skewers. Aside from my total domination of the conversation, it was a perfect evening.

I regret to say that, in my usual fashion, I turned to Ben as we got our ice cream and said, "And now in our last five minutes, tell me all about you." Believe me when I say this was not the worst of my conversational crimes. I managed to weave a depressing zinger about our depressed economy as the punchline to nearly every sentence no matter the subject matter. Through it all, Ben was a terrific sport about the whole thing.

From there, I jetted down to the Hustlaball. Last year, I attended under the guise of being Chi Chi LaRue's assistant. This year, I was (thanks to Howard at FabScout) a bona fide invited guest. In many ways, I loved being mistaken for Chi Chi's minion. No one wanted anything from me save access to the terminally accessible and personable star herself. This year, still no one wanted anything from me, though ever the publicist, Howard made sure everyone knew who the hell I was. Though, the one person who had heard of OutQ mistook my show for another, accusing me of an appalling bit about selling a used condom full of cum at 9:30am! "That's our morning show," I assured him, finally with a sense of relief at not having to defend the lurid content of my own show for a change.

Barrett Long was there, looking dapper as we sat together in the VIP lounge. He was anxious to rehash our good times last year when his then roommate Rod Barry picked a drunken fight on the patio. Suddenly, sensing the moment, he stood up and started to unzip his pants. "I've seen it!" I said, but he was persistent. "Yes but you haven't sucked on it." I dodged the inevitable hand on the back of the head and stood up, firm in my conviction to not experience his mammoth eleven inch cock first hand. "I still have my tonsils, Barrett, and this is not how I want them taken out."

Ben Andrews was there early on doing his Clark Kent shtick, but I spent most of the evening with Jackson Wild and Ryan Raz. The two of them were still rattled from some unpleasantness the night before at Octoberfist, another adjunct Hustlaball event. Jackson was drinking up a storm, even charming me into a lemon drop shot I didn't want to do, while Ryan stuck dutifully to water knowing he had a scene to do in the morning with the aforementioned Barrett Long. I didn't envy his future soreness one bit, especially after Barrett told me that once it was in he wanted Ryan to spin on it.

Jackson was excited about the eminent arrival of his boyfriend Jim. After the show on Friday prepping for my last blog entry, I did some recon on the boys and read all about Jim on Jackson's MySpace page. Jackson's love for the hunky stranger seemed worthy to me and the two of us got along great. Good thing since we spent the better part of the evening together while the boys were working the red carpet and dancing on stage. In the interim, I coaxed Jim to take his shirt off and the two of us turned the VIP lounge into our own private dance party.

Events like the Hustlaball are dicey propositions, especially in the VIP room where the crowd is made up of porn stars and the men who love them. Many of the stars are reluctant participants and the admirers are too busy staring to have much fun. That leaves it up to in-betweeners like us to actually bring the party. As an invited guest, I did my best to shore up the proceedings, short of sucking Barrett Long. After all, when all is said and done, I am still just a civilian here, having fun but always with an eye on the door that leads out to the real world where I truly belong.

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Hello There

Derek Hartley is the co-host of the GLAAD Award-winning talk show Derek and Romaine. Launched in April of 2003, Derek and Romaine is a popular evening radio show airing on the OutQ Channel on SiriusXM 108. Prior to the launch of Derek and Romaine, Derek was the author of a weekly column on PlanetOut.com called FantasyMan Island, starting in February 1997. He is the author of two books Colonnade: A Life In Columns and When Nightlife Falls. He lives in New York.